Absolute Confidence?

Statements like this one are causing me to lose confidence in the Obama administration’s economic policies. The particular investments about which the Chinese have been concerned are US Treasury securities. Absolute confidence in US Treasury securities is exactly what we don’t need. Absolute confidence in these securities is precisely the problem. The problem – for the US, anyhow – is that everyone wants to hold US Treasury securities instead of investing their money in productive activities (or spending it on the output of productive activities).

This is not just true of Americans; it is true of the world, including the Chinese. China has four choices:

It can buy US Treasury securities.

It can buy other US securities that represent productive uses of money.

It can buy non-US securities, in which case the value of the dollar will fall and make US products more attractive, thereby encouraging Americans to invest in productive activities.

Or it can buy no securities at all, in which case the value of the Yuan will rise, making non-Chinese products more attractive, thereby encouraging non-Chinese (including Americans) to invest in productive activities to replace the Chinese products that have become more expensive.

China has been choosing the first of these four options, and if it has “absolute confidence in the soundness of investments in the US,” then it will continue to choose that option, and Americans will continue not to invest in productive activities.

There is a common but misguided belief – to which President Obama, as one may surmise from his statement above, apparently subscribes – that a loss of confidence in US assets would have disastrous consequences for the US economy. In a boom time, or an inflationary time, that would be the case, but in a deflationary environment like the present, the consequences are more likely to be good. The Wall Street Journal, as an example, gives a typical statement: of the “loss of confidence would be a disaster” point of view:

In the worst-case scenario, a significant new aversion to U.S. investments could drive down the dollar and drive up interest rates, worsening the U.S. recession.

First of all, driving down the dollar would not worsen the recession; the direct effect would be to mitigate the recession by making US products more attractive. As for rising interest rates during a recession, that would indeed be a worst-case scenario, but it would not be the result of the aversion to US assets. It would be a result of a bad US policy response to that aversion.

My logic should be fairly clear:

The Treasury has a choice whether to finance long-term or short-term

The Fed has a policy – until further notice – of holding the federal funds rate below 0.25%, which policy requires it to purchase enough T-bills to keep short-term US Treasury rates near zero.

Therefore, there is no limit on the Treasury’s choice of financing. It can issue as many or as few long-term securities as it chooses. What it does not finance long term, it will be able to finance short term at a near-zero interest rate, since the Fed will purchase enough T-bills to assure this.

Therefore, the Treasury controls the supply of long-term Treasury securities.

Therefore (assuming that the demand curve for such securities has the usual downward slope in the relevant range), the Treasury controls the price of long-term Treasury securities.

During a time of potentially deflationary recession, it will not be in the nation’s interest for the Treasury to allow interest rates on its long-term securities to rise, nor will it be in the nation’s interest for the Fed to allow short-term rates to rise.

If they do so – whether or not they do so in response to a drop in demand for those securities – it is simply bad policy. Bad policy is not the result of declining confidence in US securities; it is the result of bad choices by policymakers.

So which interest rates are we talking about? Short-term Treasury interest rates? Those are controlled by the Fed and will not rise unless the Fed allows them to rise. Long-term Treasury interest rates? Those are controlled by the Treasury and will not rise unless the Treasury allows them to rise.

Or are we talking about private sector interest rates? Corporate bonds, as an example, are priced according to risk spreads over Treasury bonds. Those risk spreads depend on the amount of additional risk involved in owning corporate bonds and the amount of compensation that investors require for accepting that additional risk. The key word here is “additional.” A loss of confidence in US assets would most likely make US assets in general more risky. But how would it increase the additional risk of corporate bonds relative to government bonds? If anything it would do the opposite: the loss of confidence would weaken the dollar, making it easier for US corporations to sell their products, thereby increasing their profitability and their creditworthiness and reducing the additional risk from owning their bonds.

So – subject to exogenous changes in risk and in the price of risk – private sector interest rates will not rise either, unless policymakers allow them to rise. The only good reason to allow rates to rise would be if excess demand begins to lift the US out of its deflationary recession and to threaten it with excessive inflation – a scenario inconsistent with “worsening the US recession.” Loss of confidence in US assets is not the worst-case scenario; bad policy is. Under current circumstances, encouraging excessive confidence in US Treasury securities is itself an example of bad policy. It’s not the worst case, but it’s far from the best.

DISCLOSURE: Through my investment and management role in a Treasury directional pooled investment vehicle and through my role as Chief Economist at Atlantic Asset Management, which generally manages fixed income portfolios for its clients, I have direct or indirect interests in various fixed income instruments, which may be impacted by the issues discussed herein. The views expressed herein are entirely my own opinions and may not represent the views of Atlantic Asset Management.

6 comments:

Two commentsFor what reason the fed to keep the fed fundsRate at 0, 25 it must purchase enough T-bills to keep short-term US Treasury rates near zero?Also if there are serious default or more likely inflation fears for the US there may be no or weak demand for short term T-bills at zero or low interest rates so the Fed has to absorb all the supply by printing money that can be highly inflationarySo although it is technically correct that it will be able to finance short term at a near-zero interest rate, since the Fed will purchase enough T-bills that carries with it a challenging trade-off.

what possible reason would they have any confidence in private equities or other securities? let see. equities are down what %50 in a year? and bonds are being discounted how much? the reason the flight to US treasuries occurred is simple. the trust between the investor and those pushing the securities has been trashed. and this isn't hampering the consumer as they are already trying to live on their diminished wages since credit dried up.

But if the Fed increased its holdings of treasuries (in order to offset lost Chinese demand) wouldn't that in turn increase the money supply? If so, wouldn't that create side effects? (Granted, in a deflationary context those might be good side effects, but...)

So if China lost all confidence and unloaded $1T worth of treasuries, in order to keep interest rates the same the Fed would be buying it, increasing M0 by $1T (highly non-trivial, right?).

Granted, let me know if my logic is wrong :) (Maybe the Fed itself wouldn't need to offset everything since there could be other buyers at the right price.)

conceivable inside your article. On the off chance that your rules oblige you to just utilize 500 words, for example, it will probably be so short there is no option let you cover the subject in total. Thusly, choosing whether to put the highlight on reason or impact will give you a chance to keep the work in more reasonable terms.

About Me

I’m an economist specializing in macroeconomics, with particular interests in labor and finance. Since finishing my doctorate at Harvard University in 1994, I have been involved in a number of projects related to economics, including writing econometric software, developing quantitative methods to forecast US Treasury yields, and co-authoring The Indebted Society with James Medoff. My occasional writing has appeared in various publications such as Barron’s and Grant’s Interest Rate Observer. Currently I am Chief Economist at Atlantic Asset Management. Opinions expressed here (as well as any errors or omissions) are entirely my own and do not necessarily reflect those of Atlantic Asset Management or its officers.

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